Mission Statement

The Mission of the Karuk Department of Natural Resources is to protect, enhance and restore the cultural/natural resources and ecological processes upon which Karuk people depend. Natural Resources staff ensure that the integrity of natural ecosystem processes and traditional values are incorporated into resource management strategies.

The Department of Natural Resources is working with national, regional, and local partners to connect the hearts, hands, and minds of tribal and non-tribal communities to the health and abundance of resilient functional ecosystems. Partners from many communities and backgrounds that have taken part in our local collaborative efforts, have identified the need to create diversified revenue streams. Indigenous people's such as the Karuk, have struggled for generations to hold on to who we are. Non-tribal communities are finally recognizing the need to turn this trend around and honor the revitalization our cultural management practices.

Eco-cultural revitalization is intended to include changes in land management practices, restoring historic fire regimes, integration of adaptive management principles, intergenerational learning, development of fire adapted communities, and reincorporation of traditional knowledge, practice, and belief pathways into contemporary societal systems.

We are raising funds to start an endowment at the Humboldt Area Foundation to support our Eco-Cultural Revitalization efforts, which requires a minimum of $10,000 to initiate. This foundation manages investments to generate revenue that will then be available to support a wide range of activities.

We have great hopes that this endowment, with further investments, will grow to leverage other revenue sources and sustain operational and support capacities to continue these efforts for generations to come. Though (depending on how fast it grows) this endowment may do little to support our grass roots community based efforts in the short term, it is the longevity it has the potential to provide at an intergenerational scale that is the real benefit.

I cannot express in words or numbers how much your support could mean to the plants, animals, fish, water, and peoples of place if an endowment such as this is enabled to truly prevail. The more that is contributed the faster it will grow and become a meaningful contribution to progressing our eco-cultural revitalization efforts.

Thank you for your time and support.

Eco-Cultural Resources Management Plan

The Department of Natural Resources Eco-Cultural Resources Management Plan (ECRMP) is intended to guide future management of natural resources within the Karuk Aboriginal Territory and beyond. The ECRMP is an integrated resource management plan (IRMP) developed under the authority of the National Indian Forest Resources Management Act. Though this Act limits the implementation of IRMP’s to Tribal Trust lands, the authority provided in 43 USC Chapter 35 Federal Land Policy and Management provides for the “Coordination of plans for National Forest System lands with Indian land use planning and management programs for the purposes of development and revision”.

This should allow for coordination of the ECRMP with the Klamath and Six Rivers National Forests Land and Resource Management Plan revisions that will be occurring soon. With this coordination we should be able to once again manage the Aboriginal Territory in a manner consistent with our cultural and natural heritage. The Department of Natural Resources welcomes comments from the Tribal Membership and Descendants to help ensure that the final plan will provide lasting benefits for generations to come. We will be developing the draft provided below in consideration of the comments received to provide a final draft for council review, NEPA compliance, and approvals.

This document provides the Karuk Tribal Council an assessment of the effects of Dwinnell Dam on the salmon resources of the Shasta River and gives my perspectives for prioritizing possible recovery actions in the subbasin, including dam removal.

This report describes groundwater conditions in the Scott Valley ... and the development of a groundwater model representing the alluvial aquifer that can be used to investigate groundwater/surface-water interactions. The goal of this work is to improve understanding of the relationship between land and water use on flow conditions in the Scott River.

Passage of salmon and steelhead to the upper Shasta River was blocked by the construction of Dwinnell Dam in 1928. Approximately 22 percent of the salmon and steelhead spawning and rearing habitat of the Shasta River was lost with the construction of the dam and reservoir ... Passage to the upper river could be restored by installing a fish ladder on the dam, trapping and hauling fish around the reservoir, dam removal, or providing a bypass route around the reservoir. These four alternatives are evaluated in this report.